It seems that hazardous waste sites are frequently discovered in and around military bases and manufacturing facilities, particularly those that existed before the public became environmentally aware of the toxicity of the various substances that were being handled at these locations. Before the Government began regulating these hazardous substances, it was common place to bury these substances underground or store them in containers underground. Over the years, these substances have leached into and contaminated the surrounding soil, exposing the public to these harmful substances. The safe, efficient and effective removal and investigation of these hazardous substances are important environmental and public safety issues. For ease of discussion, the removal, or excavation, and investigation, or sampling, of these substances are individually and collectively referred to herein as “the work.”
The current practice, when dealing with these circumstances, is to evacuate a large area around the contaminated site to avoid even greater public exposure to the hazardous compounds or, in some cases, large tent-like structures are erected over and around the contaminated site. These large tent-like structures are often referred to as tension fabric structures. Setting them up and breaking down tensioned fabric structures can be very time consuming and, in some cases, it can take weeks. In addition, they are expensive to purchase, rent and transport.
These tent-like structures are designed to prevent the public from being exposed to hazardous substances. However, they are not designed to protect the remediation technicians that must enter the tent-like structures in order to conduct the work. Accordingly, the remediation technicians must then wear a personal protective ensemble (PPE) that is specially chosen for each application. While the PPE will protect the technician, it is typically cumbersome and uncomfortable, making it difficult for the technician to perform the work.
Finally, these tent-like structures, due in part to their relatively large size, require a great deal of power to operate the equipment necessary to maintain the blower-filtration system used in conjunction with these tent-like structures. Providing the power necessary to operate this equipment can be costly.
The alternative to these large tent-like structures is to evacuate an even larger area around the work site and employ no containment system. Clearly, neither of these solutions is optimal. Accordingly, there is a need for a smaller, more economic structure that is portable, minimizes or eliminates the need to evacuate the zone around the work site, and better protects the technicians that are charged with conducting the work while allowing them to be even more comfortable and productive in conducting the work.